Today, every successful company on the planet depends on technology to engage and serve customers and help create reliable and consistent 24/7 client connections.
This year, PPAI awarded six Gold and five Silver Pyramid Awards in Technology to 10 industry companies to recognize outstanding design, content relevance, ease of use and creative delivery in ecommerce websites, mobile apps and mobile websites, and web content/functionality. The sponsor for this year’s program is St Regis Group.
Since 1958, the PPAI Pyramid Award has stood as the pinnacle of achievement in the promotional products industry and has evolved over the past 63 years to recognize the ongoing transformation within businesses. Specifically, in 2018, four stand-alone awards, including Technology, Image, Suppliers Achievement and Supplier Stars, were reorganized and rebranded under the Pyramid banner, adding depth and variety to the long-time Pyramid focus on distributor promotions.
PPAI congratulates these 10 companies that won this year’s Pyramid Awards in Technology.
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Gold Winner
Distributor Category
Geiger.com, a PCI-compliant ecommerce site, provides customers with a large and carefully vetted collection of more than 10,000 products from Geiger-preferred vendors and with enhanced site speed. Built to match the customer thought process, the responsive design elements load and display on any device. New enhancements allow customers to track their order status, reference previous orders and create quotes.
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Gold Winner
Supplier Category
Hexa | Custom’s goal was to deliver fully-customized premium outerwear more efficiently and effectively than ever before. The platform (www.hexacustompromo.com) allows distributors to fully customize every jacket order from any device, at any time. The production software platform integrates with modern manufacturing machinery and sewers. The result is a highly-automated, software-driven production line that helps to increase efficiency and minimize human error.
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Silver Winner
Distributor Category
Martket Branding’s creation of the MyD2Shop.com was a strategic solution to provide branded merchandise for the film industry. The site features dual web portals to allow team members across North America seamless access to inventory tracking and fulfillment of film memorabilia. Products ordered on the MyD2Shop.com can be drop- or bulk-shipped to their choice of studio location for pickup.
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Silver Winner
Supplier Category
Featuring a sleek one-column layout, the new Koozie Group site (www.kooziegroup.com) has been redesigned to enhance the user experience. The transactional site was redesigned with customers in mind, allowing for efficient account management, resources and tools to help build the brand and close more sales. Using the latest digital best practices, the site is intended to provide a best-in-class customer experience.
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Gold Winner
Supplier Category
Gemline.com features a clean, retail-inspired and customer-friendly layout with product pages optimized for mobile viewing, large images and fonts offering better product visibility. The mobile site features full product descriptions, detailed decoration information and alternate product images allowing the customer to see every angle of the item being viewed, ensuring customers a quality shopping experience wherever they might be.
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Silver Winner
Business Services Category
Created for promotional products professionals, PromoPulse.io allows users to quickly and easily find ideas, inspiration and information from suppliers, service providers, associations and thought leaders. Users can personalize their content and their viewing preference via the app, daily email or web feed.
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Gold Winner
Distributor Category
The Corporate Specialties blog (www.corporatespecialties.com/blog) features a robust collection of editorial-quality articles that illustrate the company’s concierge approach. Informative content spotlights trends and comprehensive marketing plans intended to differentiate Corporate Specialties from the competition. The layout and ease of navigation guides clients while assisting them in making informed purchasing decisions.
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Gold Winner
Supplier Category
Gold Bond’s website (www.goldbondinc.com) incorporates new product ideas, social media information and updated search functionality along with branded and unbranded marketing tools for easy download. Tools like freight estimation, virtual samples, template downloads, inventory and order tracking round out the new design. The new content and functionality have increased engagement and the overall user experience.
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Gold Winner
Businesses Services Category
commonsku.com serves as the first point of contact for prospects and customers with the commonsku brand. The content incorporates visuals that reinforce the commonsku brand and message, blog resources, PromoStandards, event links and community-based networking. Prospects can watch videos and explore specific features and platform benefits.
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Silver Winner
Supplier Category
Gemline.com features a clean, retail-inspired and customer-friendly layout. Large images for better product visibility, pricing and product descriptions, detailed decoration information and alternate product images allow customers to see every angle of the item they are viewing. Innovative online sales tools provide users with the ability to share content, deliver customized selling solutions, check inventory, order a sample and create curated marketing collateral.
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Silver Winner
Business Services Category
The Quality Certification Alliance (QCA) blog (www.qcalliance.org) publishes educational content targeted to suppliers, distributors and end buyers. The blog offers intuitive navigation and high-quality photography to enhance reader engagement. Each post is categorized with a link that connects to additional content and is intended to provide clarity and access to compliance resources. Having fulfilled its mission, the organization was discontinued in mid-2020, but the materials on its site are still available.
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The orderly and visually pleasing design of supplier Gold Bond’s website belies the breadth and depth of information and products available. And everything is easy to find. The company’s mission is to bring brands to life through innovative promotional products and imprinting methods, and give customers more than they expect. The company’s award-winning website does just that. PPB spoke with Britney Godsey, chief sales and marketing officer, and Inna Nasledova, director of marketing, for the back story on why the new site was created and how their customers helped guide the design and functionality.
PPB What problem were you trying to solve with the new website?
Britney Godsey: Gold Bond is constantly looking for ways to adapt to the advancing needs of our client portfolio. Giving them real-time access to common touch points was a way for us to service those who work before 8 am and after 5 pm, or just when they need a quick check to keep a sale progressing forward. Helping customers gain peace of mind with real-time insight on their in-house and future orders while helping them speed up their sales cycle was a big part of our mission to service the client needs.
PPB What was the process you used to develop the site? Were any distributors involved in the brainstorming or testing?
Inna Nasledova: Here at Gold Bond, we believe that a well-designed website is more than just aesthetics. It was designed with our customer experience in mind. We relied heavily on customers’ feedback that we’ve collected through direct interactions, surveys and forms. We added a “Report Site Issues” button on the website where our customers were able to share their experiences, provide suggestions and be part of the development process. Once we had a good idea on what kind of experience our customers were looking for, we were able to determine our goals, define scope and move on to the development and implementation. We constantly look for ways to improve our customer experience and serve them the best we can.
PPB Was the site developed in-house or did you work with an outside company?
Nasledova: We have a great in-house team of marketing and IT professionals who are responsible for overseeing the website development process. We’ve done a portion of web design in-house, such as creating wireframes and prototypes, and we used an outside company for the development, testing and implementation.
PPB When was this new site rolled out and in what ways has it helped Gold Bond’s business?
Nasledova: The website was launched in 2020 and it’s been a great tool for our customers so far. It helped our business by giving our customers a clear idea of what our brand is about and what types of products and services we offer. It also gave our customer base an opportunity to interact with our business in multiple ways. We don’t believe in a launch-and-leave approach; therefore, we strive to continuously improve our website by focusing on optimizing performance and experience based on site analytics, performance metrics and user research and feedback.
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Winners of the 2022 PPAI Pyramid Awards in all five categories—Client Programs, Marketing Programs, Supplier Star, Technology and Supplier Decorating—will be announced in December in an issue of PPB Newslink. Sign up to get the free twice-weekly PPAI e-newsletter at pubs.ppai.org/subscribe.
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Tina Berres Filipski is editor of PPB.
